


Scraps of Red

by Ember_Keelty



Category: Dragon Age - All Media Types, Dragon Age II, Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M, Gen, other characters appear but I would prefer not to flood the tags
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-03-01
Updated: 2017-05-05
Packaged: 2018-09-27 18:35:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,766
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10038752
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ember_Keelty/pseuds/Ember_Keelty
Summary: A collection of drabbles, double-drabbles, and other shortfic about red mage Marian Hawke.





	1. Roguish

It's a long wait for the ship. Hawke passes time by _doing things_ with that knife of hers. Polishing. Sharpening. When she spreads her off-hand on the table and starts stabbing between her fingers, Aveline snaps.

"Why do you even need that thing? I've seen how you fight."

"Isn't it obvious?" Hawke asks. Aveline thinks, _Blood magic_ , but Hawke says, "Sometimes you can stab someone, or threaten to stab them, and walk away after. If you use magic, everyone who sees you has to die."

"I notice I'm not dead yet."

Hawke shrugs. "Just don't make me regret that."


	2. Forget Their Pride

"How do I look?" Bethany asks, arms held out awkwardly to display the lace details on the sleeves of her new dress. "Bloodless, right? I really shouldn't try to wear bright colors, let alone bright _red_."

There are voices coming from behind Hawke, somewhere outside the room she shares with her sister in the Amell estate. Maybe it's Mother and Carver having another argument in the halls. Hawke ignores them, not wanting to turn away from Bethany.

"You look lovely," Hawke tells her. "Like a princess. Now give it a twirl!"

"You are _far_ too kind." Bethany rolls her eyes, but is obliging enough to at least twist back and forth a little, making the skirts ruffle if not quite billow out. "Though I suppose I _do_ look like a minor noble. Since I am one. Bethany Amell. How does _that_ sound?"

It sounds wrong.

"We're our father's daughters," Hawke reminds her. "We shouldn't forget that."

"Why shouldn't we? What sort of legacy did _he_ leave us? Poverty and a painful curse, that's all." Apparently feeling a bit bolder now, Bethany gives a proper twirl, momentarily becoming a dervish of red silk and black tresses. "Marian Amell!" she proclaims triumphantly when she comes to a dizzy, wobbling stop.

She sounds so happy, and she's smiling like she's never smiled before, and it would be cruel to take this away from her. Marian _is_ cruel, she knows, but not to Bethany, never to Bethany — and now that they're both safe, she doesn't have to be cruel to anyone.

Even so...

"My name is Hawke," says Hawke. "And we are _not_ cursed."

"Oh, Marian." A touch of the old wistfulness begins to creep back into Bethany's smile, and Hawke feels a jolt of regret so powerful it leaves her head spinning. "You don't have to try so hard to be strong. You've already saved me. I know what I am, but it doesn't hurt anymore, because we're so filthy rich we can _buy_ normality. No more running. No more hiding. No more being _apostates_."

Bethany all but spits the word, and Hawke feels the same pulse of _wrongness_ in her chest as she felt at the attempt to strip away her name. "I can't not be an apostate." Normality has never been an alternative. The only alternative is allowing herself to be chained. Besides, the last time Hawke heard that word directed at her was...

Was...

It was _something important_ , even if she can't quite remember why.

"Marian, this isn't who you are. You never _wanted_ your whole existence to be a political statement. You hated seeing me ashamed, so you tried to be proud, but you know that there's nothing to be proud of." Bethany takes hold of Hawke's hands. Her fingers are soft, the callouses from years of farm work and staff practice already fading. "And look: I'm happy now. _We're_ happy now. You can stop pretending to care about anything else."

She's right. Of course Bethany's right. Marian's sister has always known her better than anyone else, and one thing she must know is that Marian is deeply, fundamentally selfish. Anything that isn't a threat to her or her family is best off avoided, lest it become one. If she's been acting a bit differently these past few years, if she's started helping people — helping _mages_ — she doesn't know and has no reason to care about, it's only because she's gotten reckless now that Bethany—

Hawke tugs her hands back, attempting to wrench them free, but can't bring herself to use quite enough force. "You aren't Bethany." It opens its mouth to respond, but Hawke cuts it off. "Bethany is dead." She forces herself to speak the words out loud. The pain is grounding. "And that's not all, is it? Mother is dead. Carver is... gone." And that means the voices behind her are—

 _"You can't just go charging in there! That's_ Hawke _it's got as a shield_ , _you glowing lunatic!"_ Aveline.

"She is enthralled! We cannot waste any more time!" And that's...

 _"Do we know what will happen if she dies here? Will she wake up Tranquil? Will she wake up at all?"_ Merrill.

"If that fiend gets ahold of her, she will wake up an abomination!" That voice. It's less familiar than the other two, but clearer, more real — almost as real as Bethany's.

 _"Then you'll have one more thing to bond over."_ Aveline again.

"Do not make light of this! She is in danger! Hawke, you must not surrender!" 

One of the threads that slipped from her grasp earlier returns to her. Apostate. _I never thought I'd meet another mage like you — an apostate_. Not the same voice, but the same intensity. The same _being_. She thought he was babbling when he said that, because she knows he's met other runners. He's helped them run. Occasionally, she's helped too. But he meant a little more than that, didn't he? She doesn't belong to the Chantry, not in any way. She doesn't belong to anything or anyone, least of all this demon.

"He's a demon too," the thing wearing her sister's skin says, its grip moving up to her wrists and tightening like shackles. "But you love him anyway, don't you? So why not give me a chance? Just let me in. I promise we can be happy together. You've never _really_ been happy without her, have you? What have you got to lose?"

"How dare you _use_ her?" Hawke pulls back again, enough to get a hand around the hilt of her dagger, and then one of the demon's hands is gone, releasing her wrist and shriveling into something visibly inhuman as it falls to the ground. The thing shrieks, its form rippling. "No one uses Bethany against me! Not Carver! Not you! No one!" Without enough space between them to draw her staff, Hawke just stabs it repeatedly, striking at its shapelessly shifting center mass until it swats her away with its remaining paw.

Hawke hits the floor, cracking her head against hard tile where a moment ago she could have sworn there was a rug. She drops the knife and goes for her staff, but before she can drag herself to her feet, Aveline charges past her, bashes the demon senseless with her shield, and runs it through. It withers and dies and seeps into the ground, and the Amell estate fades out to the Gallows courtyard.

It's Merrill who takes Hawke's hand and pulls her up. Anders — Justice — stands back and watches her with an inscrutably alien expression, his eyes blanked out by the glow of the Fade.

"You should have a little more faith in me," Hawke tells him, belatedly thinking through the significance of the argument she overheard. It's one way to take her mind off of what she just watched happen to something still vaguely shaped like Bethany. "I've said I can take care of myself, and I know _you_ heard me too. Not that I realized you were so concerned for me."

"I despise creatures of Sloth with all of my being," says Justice's voice through Anders' mouth. "To simply stand aside and allow a mage to fall to one would be... anathema." Before Hawke can respond, he moves forward, his unconstrained stride taking full advantage of the length of Anders' legs and carrying him to the front of the party in just a few steps. "Come. We must find and aid the boy, as we have promised to his mentor."

"I know you aren't a demon," Hawke says to his rigidly straight back. "It didn't take that word from _my_ mind. Not in reference to you, anyway."

"There is no time for idle chatter," Justice replies. And there really isn't, because he hasn't stopped moving for a second. Hawke has to double her usual pace to catch up with him, and when she does, she has no breath left over to talk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Because it would have been so much more _fun_ if Torpor had gone all out against Hawke instead of just showing its hand and trying to make a deal.


	3. The Duel

It's not a hard choice. Kill the Arishok, prevent a massacre on both sides. If he kills her then she'll be dead, as he so eloquently put it, but her life is already forfeit. What are her other options? Betray Isabela? If Hawke does that, she'll deserve whatever Meredith has planned for her. Start a war and slip away in the chaos? She _could_ do that, but...

There is no "but". That's exactly what she should do, what any sane person _would_ do. But it isn't what Hawke's going to do, and that's that.

She walks past her gang as she and the Arishok take their positions and considers telling Anders, _You shouldn't watch this_. She thinks about saying, _A duel means one-on-one. Not two-on-one, and definitely not three-on-one. Clear enough?_ But unlike her, he still has some unexposed secrets left, and the best way to maintain that state of affairs is to not draw attention to him. She avoids even meeting his eyes, instead nods to Varric and says, "Get ready to take notes."

She realizes, a little belatedly, that she has no idea how a Qunari duel is meant to start. Is there a countdown, or some kind of signal? Or does it begin when someone makes the first move? It's a bit late to ask now, so Hawke just stares down the Arishok and pulls her armor around her, stone solidifying from nothing but the concept of stone.

The Arishok holds out his sword like a jouster's lance and charges.

Straight to the point, then. Good. That's one thing she always liked about him.

He's on her before she manages to get her staff level, and all she can do is sidestep and let his momentum carry him past her. She was prepared for inhuman strength, but not for anything like that speed. It was obvious just from looking at him that he could smash her head open with his bare hands, but she thought she would be all right as long as she stayed moving and didn't let him get close.

New plan: kill him quick, before he inevitably does get close.

Hawke spins on her heels and shoots off a fist of stone as the Arishok plows past her. It connects with the back of his head as he pulls up just short of colliding with a pillar, and slams him face-first into the marble. That move has shattered skulls like eggs struck with a hammer, but those were the skulls of humans and dwarves. If the Arishok is even bleeding, Hawke doesn't see it, and she can't waste time looking. She has to finish him while he's too stunned to strike back.

She casts a web of lightning at his chest, wide enough that it's bound to hit his heart if his anatomy is even a little like what she assumes. The Arishok bellows and convulses.

Then he whirls around, outstretched sword cutting a wider arc than Hawke anticipated, and the flat of the blade strikes her hard enough to crack her armor.

The stone crumbles around her, as much from her own shock and broken focus as from the blow itself. The next swing of his sword impales her chest, and then she's in the air, lifted above him, her blood showering down on his upturned face.

Too much blood.

She is, she realizes, dead.

She's dead, but she isn't going to let that stop her.

Her staff has fallen at his feet, but she still has her hands, if only for a little while longer. It's going to destroy her own flesh to channel the amount of magic she needs directly through her body, but that hardly matters now. Everything that remains of her mana, she pools into her right arm — first to strengthen it enough to move through the blood-drained weakness, then to ready her final attack. The Arishok shakes his sword, tearing her insides and sending her dangling limbs swinging wildly, but she manages to get a loose grip on his face, fingers just below his eyes and palm over his nose and mouth.

Her hand explodes with cold magic. She forces it down the Arishok's throat, freezing his insides all the way to his lungs. His eyes burst open like overripe grapes as all the moisture in them turns to crystal ice. His sword falls from his hand, and she falls with it, but he hits the ground before she does.

There. Finished.

Poor bastard. If she were in his place, she doubts she would have held out half so long before trying to raze Kirkwall to dust.

Which doesn't mean she's going to forgive him for killing her. She's petty like that.

The pain gets worse as the battle high fades — bad enough that she tries to rip the sword from her chest just to make it go faster, but her arms won't move. One is frozen from the inside and falling apart around the spikes of ice sticking out through the flesh. The other, though undamaged, is somehow just as heavy and useless.

She almost calls out for Anders, but thankfully, her voice dies in her throat. He needs to get out of here while he still can, and even if that weren't the case, she doubts that there's much he could do for this. _I'm a mage, not a miracle worker_ , he likes to say, and while that isn't strictly accurate, he does have his limits.

What was the last thing she said to him? The last thing he said to her? She can't remember. Probably nothing meaningful enough for a final good bye.

Kirkwall drinks her down. White, inert stone slakes itself with vivid, fluid red. Hawke's eyes and ears go the way of her limbs, blackness and silence closing in on her. If the crowd reacts to her bleeding out, she can't see or hear it. Not that she noticed any earlier reactions on their part, either. She was too focused on the fight.

It's almost funny: she did this for them, and she completely forgot they were there. That's all right, though; they'll forget her too, soon enough.

If she were a real hero, Hawke supposes she'd be happy to give her life away for something greater. But she isn't a hero. She's a vicious, mercenary, thuggish witch, and all she feels besides the physical pain is bitter anger. This is as much Petrice's and Varnell's mess as it is Isabela's, and the Grand Cleric's and the Knight Commander's for not reining them in. Aveline's, too — because a crime report is just a rumor if it comes from an elf, apparently — and the Viscount's. If she had the strength to speak, she would curse them all out. By now she's resigned to cleaning up other people's messes, but she deserves a better reward for it than this.

She doesn't have the strength to speak, though. She did her part to serve man, and now she's dying in silence, like a good mage. How convenient for Meredith. How bloody convenient for everyone in Hightown. They can all pretend they respect her without ever having to tolerate her presence.

Pain gives way to numbness. Everything is dark and cold. Hawke remembers Merrill's voice through a different, thinner haze of blood loss: _Don't take any paths in the Fade_. She couldn't now, even if she wanted to, even if she saw any paths to take. She's frozen like a statue and weighed down by a tangle of chains. Maybe this is the Void, but it still feels like Kirkwall.

When she thinks that, she also thinks, _Well? Aren't you even a little bit grateful?_

The embrace of the chains remains rough and indifferent. She does not matter. She never mattered. She did give to the gutters, blood wrapped in flesh wrapped in rags or in armor, but it was crumbs compared to the gifts from the priests in their castles. Slaves from the dragon priests, or mages from the chant priests — or whatever the qun priests choose to offer, should it come to that. The petty mortal details are of no significance. The ribs of the Gallows will never go bare.

Suddenly, there is a light.

The light is a flame. The flame is blue as water. Hawke hates the Chant, hates how deeply it's lodged in her head, but _fire is her water, see fire and go towards Light_ rings through her, because she wants relief from the darkness like she wants water, like she wants life.

Then the flame envelops her, and the rote lines of Transfigurations burn away along with the whispers of the chains. Other words in another voice take their place. _It will not have you. I refuse to allow it. This is not your price to pay._

She burns and she hurts and she screams, then realizes abruptly what it means that she is screaming. That's her voice, drawn from the breath of her lungs. She can hear it, which means that she can hear. The pain is not from the fire, but from reawakened awareness of her own damaged body. Her arm as it thaws. Her chest as the hole in it closes. Her head as the blood rushes too quickly back into it.

Her eyes regain their sight, and the first thing she sees is Anders staring down at her, swaying on his knees, sweat dripping from his temples and plastering his hair to his skin.

"You're back," he says with almost childlike joy in his voice, and smiles so widely that his face has to crinkle up to fit it.

Then he topples forward and almost knocks the breath right back out of her as he lands draped across her chest.

"Anders, what did you do?" Hawke demands. If he burnt his life away to restore hers, she will never forgive him.

"Mm. Magic." He sounds delirious, but at least he's still talking. His hand seeks out hers, the one she thought was ruined, and the feeling of his palm pressing against her own is only partially numbed. She curls her fingers around his, and even that slight motion sends fresh spikes of pain stabbing through them, but it's encouraging that she can manage it at all.

Her other arm is easier to move. She wraps it around Anders and lays her hand just below his left shoulder, where the worst of the scars on his back — the one with a similar mark on his chest directly obverse from it — hides beneath his coat. "We'll match now," she says with a strange swell of pride, and he hums with what might be agreement or might just be exhaustion.

She may be a little delirious herself.

Hawke gradually remembers that they aren't alone and realizes how absurdly shameless they must look lying curled around each other on the floor of Viscount's Keep, but she has difficulty caring. She's dimly aware of Aveline standing over her, barking out orders for her men to form a barrier and for the rest of the crowd to stay back. Varric is saying _something_ , some sort of argument or explanation, the rhythm of his voice familiar even if the words are too fast for Hawke to make out. Fenris insinuates himself among the guards, silent and uninvited, and though she can't see his face, Hawke knows perfectly well how he's glaring at anyone who gets too close.

A part of her thinks, _Stupid, now they'll kill us all_ , but after what she and Anders just did, that part of her seems more distant and less credible than it ever has before. They are not easy people to kill.


	4. Holy Poison

The Templars didn't kill Bethany. On bad days, Hawke's convinced that she did. Aveline, always the voice of moderation, insists that there's no one to blame but a mindless ogre and the Blight itself.

And yet...

Hawke still remembers the Lothering chantry, the holy sisters with the slow, sweet poison of their gospel drip-drip-dripping from their tongues and into Bethany's ears. If she had not believed herself a curse upon the world and a burden to her loved ones, would she have been so quick to throw her life away?

When Hawke learned _that_ chantry had burned in the Blight, she felt nothing.

Now the Kirkwall chantry burns, and Anders cringes in the flickering shadows of the fire, his face turned away from her. It takes Hawke longer than it should to realize that he is offering himself up for retribution, because retribution against _him_ is the furthest thing from her mind.

She wraps her arms around his shoulders and feels him tense up for a moment. Then she presses a kiss against the top of his head, hiding away her smile in his hair, and he relaxes against her.

_She_ won't let them take anyone else, either.


	5. A Beast in Skyhold

"I was _there_!" The Champion's claws close around Cullen's throat. His mind stutters as she shoves him back against the parapet and brings her knife up an inch from his face. He'd come out here to clear the air with her, but he barely managed two sentences before she turned into this feral beast. "I am a witch, not a Circle mage brought up on a diet of poison so I'll forget what my own eyes have seen the moment you tell me it wasn't real."

"P-poison?" Is that some paranoid delusion born from the overcrowded mind of her pet abomination?

"Don't speak to me." The gauntlet clamped to his neck tightens so that he could not even if he wanted to. "Don't let me find you anywhere there are no witnesses. Know that there's just one thing in this whole bloody world I care about enough to keep me from killing you under the eyes of the Inquisition and facing whatever consequences come, and when you say your prayers, remember to thank the Maker for Anders."

She lets go and stalks off, but fear lingers in her wake.

How is he to live his life trapped with a predator?


End file.
